1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a memory device and a method of fabricating the same. More particularly, the present invention relates to a solid state electrolyte memory device and a method of fabricating the same.
2. Description of Related Art
The demands for non-volatile memories have been dramatically grown since 1999, that is because, considerable wide applications continuously appear in the recent years, for example, portable disks, digital camera memory cards, cell phone memories, so a novel market that cannot be covered by any of the technologies is created.
The current non-volatile memory product is flash memory. However, the architecture of the current flash memory elements has gradually faced the challenge of physical limitations after the 65 nm technology era. Moreover, the flash memory also faces challenges from various characteristic limitations, for example, low operation speed and short operation cycles, so its application is greatly limited. Accordingly, many technologies have been widely researched and discussed. However, there are many potential worries about these technologies, for example, the potential of size keep reducing, excessively high power consumption during switching, etc. Therefore, it is required to further develop and update a memory technology having a deep potentials and capable of meeting the vast memory requirements in the future.
One of the memory devices that have been extensively researched currently is resistance random access memory (RRAM), which uses transition metal oxides as resistance converting materials. However, the mechanism for the resistance changes of the transition metal oxides remains uncertain till now. Many research institutes set forth various different theories to explain the changes in the transition metal oxides, for example, a filamentary current path theory, an oxygen deficiency rearrangement theory. As the mechanism is till unclear, the feature problems of the RRAM elements, such as endurance, cannot be effectively solved. For example, some literatures show that the CuxO RRAM can only be operated for about 600 cycles.
On the other aspect, some people researches solid state electrolyte memory, which has desirable endurance performance. In the research of Ag-containing GeSe material in the Solid-state Laboratory, University of Arizona, USA, the test has already been performed for 1010 cycles. Therefore, this new technology deserves deep research.